The illness and death of Henry Prince of Wales in 1612 : a historical case of typhoid fever / by Norman Moore.

  • Moore, Norman, 1847-1922.
Date:
1882
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Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The illness and death of Henry Prince of Wales in 1612 : a historical case of typhoid fever / by Norman Moore. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

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    was probably intended for bis profession and the learned world in general.1 I shall first give a translation of Mayerne's French and fuller account of the Prince's illness, and shall then state in a concise form and in modern terms the symptoms recorded. Mayerne2 was at the time physician to King James I. He is the French physician alluded to in the passage I have quoted from Coke, and had the chief direction of the case. I have omitted nothing but a page of preface in which the reasons for publishing an account of the case are set forth—that it is to explain a death which the age and constitution of the Prince had made unexpected, to answer malignant talkers, and to make the truth known. True Account of the Illness, Death, and Opening of the Body of the Most High and Most Illustrious Henry, Prince of Wales, deceased, at St. James's in London, the 6th of November, 1612. Mors sceptra ligonibus sequat. The fact is as follows :— His Highness was in the nineteenth year of his age, and of a very warm constitution, wont to bleed very often and much, from the nose, even without exercise, but much more after violent bodily exertion. This natural evacuation was suppressed for three months during the past summer of this year 1612 (excessive in degree and continuance of heat beyond the memory of living man in England). The Prince continually fatigued his body by exercises and violent occupations, hunting in the heat of the day, riding and playing tennis, and in consequence he often healed his blood extraordinarily (for it was his habit, having started in the morning, not to sit down all day long:). And further, he ate strangely to excess of fruit, and especially of melons and of half-ripe grapes, and often eating his full of fish and of raw and cooked oysters beyond rule or measure at each meal, three or four days of the week. He would more- over finish, in order to cool the burning heat which worked in 1 Theo. Turquet Mayernii, 'Opera Medicn,' ed. J. Browne, London, 1701. Another copy in the Library of the Royal College of Physicians is dated 1700, but in no way differs from this : 1701 seems the true date of the edition. a T. T. Mayerne was son of Louis T. de Mayerne, who wrote a history of Spain. He was born near Geneva in 1573, and Beza was his godfather. He took his M.B. degree at Montpellier in 1596; his M.D. in 1597. He was successively physician to Heury IV of France, James I, Charles I, and Charles II, of England. He died at Chelsea in 1655. Astruc, ' Mdmoires pour servir a l'Histoire de la Faculte de Medecine de Montpellier.' Edited by Dr. Lorry. Paris, 1767.